loop-contractlisted

# Loop Contract ## What this skill produces Given a raw need, this skill has **two responses, one front-door**. It first *triages* (step 0): when an existing skill/plugin/agent already fits, it **routes** — names that capability and offers to run it. Only when nothing fits does it *design*, and for a long autonomous job the design is a **contract** — which, for a DONE job, it then **executes** rather than handing back as a document. Routing lives in `references/triage-routing.md`; the rest of this document is the contract — the harder, higher-stakes response. A **contract is the spine of a run** — the mission, oracle, phases and budget, written down before the work so the run is disciplined instead of improvised. In **both** modes you write it and then execute it yourself (§5) — the document guides the work, it does not replace it. The one exception is an explicit request for a contract to run elsewhere. Either way it must be precise enough that an agent with no memory of this conversation can execute it correctly and stop at the right moment. **When the response is a KNOWN contract, never start doing the described job.** If the request is "audit PR #128", you do not audit PR #128 while writing the contract — you write the contract that makes auditing it reliable. If you catch yourself opening the repo to "check something first", stop; you are doing the job instead of designing it. **The prohibition is temporal, not modal.** It means: do not start the job while the cont